What a nice gesture

Paragon may be on the way out, but Epic Games ??is making the most of the MOBA's demise.

It's giving away a bunch of game assets for developers to use as they see fit in Unreal Engine 4, including the "base meshes, textures, skins, animations, abilities and character FX, and dialogue" for 20 different Paragon characters.? Th??ere's also free environmental assets and a sample map.

"The assets, built at a cost of over $12,000,000, encompasses 20 triple-A characters and over 1,500 environment components from Paragon," says Epic. "Download the Paragon packs for free and use them in your own UE4 projects, with no strings attached!" ??That even goes for commercial projects.

The company plans to release more characters later this spring and summer. If you've ever tinkered with game development, you'll know how helpful stuff like this can be. Smart move on Epic's p??art.

E??pic Releases $12,000,000 of Par??agon Content for Free [Unreal Engine]

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It lasted longer than I thought it would

Citing the lack of a "clear path [...] to grow Paragon into a MOBA that retains enough players to be sustainable," Epic has decided to sunset the game. The servers are shutting down on April 26, 2018 and as players leave leading up to that date, "matchmaking times and quality?? will further degrade."

It's not terribly surprising to hear the game is winding down, but this part of the plan is: "Epic is offering a full refund to every Paragon player for every purchase on any platform." The company will issue refunds itself (as opposed to your platform provider) and you can request one here.

I always had the impression that Paragon was doing well enough, but I suppose the stakes are just too high to keep something like this not only running but actively growing. (Also, Fortnite Battle Royale.)

"We truly appreciate everything you've put into Paragon," said Epic. "We received many p??assionate ideas for where to take the game; the outpouring of thoughtful suggestions is another testament to this incredible com??munity."

Paragon to Close on April 26 [Epic Games]

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Clear your schedule

Still to sample Paragon, or simply can’t get enough? Clear your schedule -- there&rsquo?;s a Free Beta Weekend on its way.

From Thursday May 26 ??to Monday May 30, 2016 (I know, that's technically longer than a weekend!) any interested party can jump into the fray on PC or PlayStation 4.

Paragon is currently in paid Early Access, with a “completely free open beta” scheduled sometime in the next few months. For more info — or to register — head on over to the website now.

Steve doesn’t like MOBAs, but he “had a good time playing Paragon”.

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I'm giving it a go

As someone who has played MOBAs since the dawn of the original DOTA mod, I'm all about trying new things that stray from the typical formula. Heroes of the Storm does that wonderfully, and Paragon ??;for PC and PS4, based on early impressions, seems to follow that route as well.

You'll get a chance to see for yourself on March 18 when it hits the Early Access stage. Players can buy Founder's Packs ($19.99) starting on March 14, but Epic promises that you can unlock every "card" (read: boosters, which seems to be the main way to monetize the game) without paying and all characters are free. There will also be Challenger Packs ($59.99) and Master Packs ($99.99) that have various bonuses as we?ll.

The best part of all? Progress will not be wiped from March 18 on. Epic says that this is because the game is mostly finished, but there's not a lo??t of concessions for newer players and some placeholder assets, which is fine with me. A looming threat of a progress wipe is what always what holds me back from playing something like this early, so I'??m in.

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New game from Epic is alright

Epic Games (Gears of War) announced Paragon (PS4, PC) at PlayStation Experience, an in-tight, third-person MOBA from the developer of seminal shooters like Gears of War and Unreal Tournament. Yes, everything is a MOBA these days.

For me that's usually a cue to glaze my eyes over with a special goop my eyes have started secreting at will over the past five years. I played League of Legends once, the weekend it released almost seven years ago (want to feel old!?). Not really my eye-jam.

But the MOBA is a tricksy scamp and as Johnny-come-latelies try to get into the game dominated by League and Dota 2, they often have to do so on the strength of an existing brand or by way of a special hook -- in Paragon's instance, high graphical fidelity and gameplay that feels a bit closer to an obj??ective-based shooter, or at least tricks you into thinking so with the close camera angle. Als?o I played every match as an archer, so, there's that.

The result: I do not like MOBAs, but I had a good time playing Paragon.

Feeling much more comfortable with the idea of third-person shooter than a MOBA, I elected to go with a ranged character, Sparrow, whom happened to be one of the plain strongest characters in ?the game. This will be important later. On the range??d, damage-dealing side, there's also the faster, somewhat weaker, dual-wielding Twin Blast and the sniper Murdock, who does energy damage rather than physical like Sparrow.

The latter is important because th?ere is a card deck system tied to your character's performance ceiling. You can build your own deck, though we played using pre-made starter decks which were made to buff your chara?cter in the most typical way -- for Sparrow, that meant slowly increasing things like physical damage and rate of fire as you level up (in addition to unlocking or upgrading your moves by way of earned experience). Cards can only be assigned, trashed, or otherwise dealt with at base and there's a button to teleport back to base (it takes a few seconds of vulnerability), which is useful for various reasons.

Once I stopped getting shot up by laser beams in enemy-controlled towers (they're dotted along the map and the goal is to push forward across three lanes towards your opponents' base, which you want to destroy) and kind of figured basic MOBA-things out, I became an absolute wrecking machine with Sparrow, driving entire lanes by myself and doubling the next highest player's kill count. 16 and 5 like nothing. Warning: it might be that I had fun with Paragon because, in the controlled environment with other press and developers, I was really good. Completely unearned, too, which is great. Now I know what it feels like to be born wealthy. And? it probably won't be like that in a live, global environment (where teamwork and cooperation will be way more important). But man I kicked ass.

Paragon is a MOBA your average idiot (like me) can pick up, which is good because it's coming to PS4, too. It works fairly well with a controller, though going at it after getting comfy with the mouse and keyboard, I preferred the latter. Especially for that ranged accuracy. Paragon also aims to have "the most advanced rep??lay system on the market" for spectating and sharing purposes, with information-laden UI elements, various cameras (following one "Hero," or a free-flying drone), and slow/fast motion. You can even sort through the full recording of a match by instances of kills, tower failure, or high damage -- it tells you where the highlights are, basically.

It'd probably take the right circumstances to get me on Paragon again (for instan?ce: it being my job to do so), but I had fun over the three or fo??ur matches I played. There are 13 characters to choose from and the 1 map at the moment, while adequate controller support and high-fidelity mean it could boost its success on the console front.

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You can still sign up for the beta

I've mostly stayed away from the Paragon marketing, as I'd prefer to just jump into the beta when there's something actually substantial to see. Then again,? this is the last of the character reveal trailers, so it allow??s me to rant a bit while we wait for the actual game to hit.

To get in on that beta, you can still sign up here. To be honest, I'm much more excited for their ongoing open-sourced Unreal Tournament project.

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This birdie's not saying a word

We're getting a firm grasp on Paragon's who, but we're still left in the dark as to its what. Epic has had no prob?lem rolling out teaser trailers for the game's roster, but has neglected to tell us anything of substance about it. All in due time, I suppose.

Sparrow is the third of ??five characters. She has a fancy bow and a determined look in her eye. Sorry if those scant details aren't good enough; we're dealing with a real l??ack of facts here.

On November 3, beefcake Twinblast was shown off. Last week, it was the equally beefy Steel (embedded below). I originally wrote Twinblas??t's name as "Steelblast" and considered leaving it because it seemed like it didn't matter ??much.

As for the gameplay of Paragon, people are expecting a PC shooter. How these characters correlate with one another is very much still a mystery. The silver lining is that there's a beta (sign up here) soon and that should cause all the c??onfusion to melt away.

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